The film is set to incite strong reactions, not only in the Muslim world, but in Europe as well. For that reason, the Dutch government had recently warned Mr Wilders, an MP for the rightwing Freedom Party (PVV), not to release the film. Dutch broadcasters refused to show it and a US-based web service deactivated the site for the film at the weekend after receiving complaints.

"No provocation"The first to address the assembled press was Mr Wilders himself, who said the film was not intended as a "provocation", but as a "final warning" and an invitation to Muslims to join the debate about Islam. Fitna, he said, "depicted the hard realities" of modern life and "now we have to draw the political conclusions".

Speaking on prime time news, Islam expert Maurits Berger agreed that the film should not be seen as a provocation, nor dismissed as blasphemous. "It presents a succession of images which we have all seen in recent years," he said. The anticipated widespread demonstrations in the Muslim world, Mr Berger added, "would be an exaggerated response".

Spokesmen for Muslim organisations in the Netherlands were quoted as expressing relief: "The pictures are atrocious, but the film is not as shocking as expected" and "Fitna represents a caricature of Islam". National alert levels, which recently went up, have not been raised any further.

Looking at my pocket blasph-o-meter, I’m not noticing a lot of movement. I was expecting something more controversial. The images and general content are familiar to all who pay attention to the foreign-policy oriented conservative blogosphere. This isn’t really a critique; most people probably don’t read these news sources so there is some place for slick popularization. I just ended up surprised when he didn’t delve into theologically touchy subjects like Muhammed’s life or the construction of the Quran. Maybe Hugh Fitzgerald will jump into film and popularize some more damning stuff. na

I'm just happy the thing is out and in the open for people to see, to show the world either way that one can make a movie about Islam that should be offensive to them in comparison to the Danish cartoons, for example, andMuslims react by being typically violent, which proves Wilders' point, or they do nothing, which gives the green light to all of us to make films if we so choose about the nature of Islam, and the Muslims have no reason to complain about anything further if they don't complain about Wilders' efforts. So they put u or shut up. They can't legitimately let this one slide and then bitch about the next one.

Yeah, I think Wilders' genius isn't in the film making, but in building up the real world scene before the film's release so that all the politicians and others unwilling to defend freedom of speech would reveal themselves as directionless appeasers; and now they should be embarrassed because outside the implicit editorial voice, and a few captions, there is no Western voice in the film: only Muslims are talking.

It's also interesting to speculate whether this will allow Muslims to justify riots to each other, if that is what the string pullers in Damascus, etc., want. Wilders has been playing with us all, and that's the real story here.